Keep Pickens Beautiful is grateful to everyone in our community who helps reduce trash headed to the landfill, recycles, beautifies the area around their home or business, and educates others about environmentally responsible options. In addition to expressing our appreciation, we also recognize community members who are making extraordinary efforts to beautify Pickens County and who reduce their environmental impact through our Green Awards.
Green Ribbon and Green Thumb Awards are given to selected individuals, groups, clubs, or businesses in Pickens County. These awards recognize outstanding examples of programs, projects, or activities that protect or enhance our community’s environment.
Thank you 1-800-Packouts!
The Green Ribbon is awarded to local businesses and organizations for their beautification efforts and environmental stewardship.  For February/March 2022, KPB has awarded the Green Ribbon to 1-800-Packouts.
If your home or business experiences a flood, fire, or other disaster, 1-800-Packouts is there to help! They will come ‘pack out’ all the items in your home or business and will store them in their private storage facilities until you’re ready to move back in. If your items are damaged, such as fabrics that smell like smoke from a fire, they have specialized tools and processes to clean your property before placing it in storage.
1-800-Packouts’ Efforts to Recycle and Reuse
Keep Pickens Beautiful learned about the services provided by 1-800-Packouts from Kenny Woodard, the director at the Pickens Recycling Center (and one of our Board members). He told us that they recycle a tremendous volume of cardboard, to the extent that they bought their own roll-off cardboard dumpster that they take to our local center every week or two!
As 1-800-Packouts explains:
Recycling cardboard was something we saw as being a good steward of resources, but we did not realize the impact it had on our community. When we reached out to Kenny Woodard to discuss recycling options, he showed such enthusiasm for supporting our efforts to recycle. He explained the benefits of recycling and the impact we would have with reducing landfill waste and increasing revenue for Pickens County. He even allowed us to take our box truck filled with recyclable cardboard to the new recycling center. Since then, we have changed our recycling process to a dedicated recycling dumpster that we can easily dump at the recycling center.
In addition to the recycling efforts of 1-800-Packouts, they also divert truckloads of reusable items from the landfill. Often, after a disaster, people will decide that they no longer want their items. The 1-800-Packouts team takes these reusable items to the Community Thrift Store. They are either sold in the Thrift Store to help generate funds to support their many worthy causes such as community grants, CARES, Good Samaritan, the Pregnancy Center, and more. Any items that the Pickens County community can’t use are then taken to Must Ministries (who serves Cherokee and Cobb counties).
Keep Pickens Beautiful thanks 1-800-Packouts and their team for diverting so much from landfills through recycling and donating for reuse. KPB is honored to award them the Green Ribbon for February/March 2022.
About the Green Awards
If you have a nominee for a future Green Award, or if you would like to help, contact Keep Pickens Beautiful. KPB has been serving Pickens County since 1989 through various projects and initiatives with an emphasis on recycling, beautification, and education. A primary focus of KPB is to work collaboratively with local residents and businesses to keep Pickens County clean and beautiful.
Contact KPB at KeepPickensBeautiful.org or stop by their office at the south end of Main Street Monday – Friday, 11:00-3:00.